Posted
by
Soulskillon Tuesday September 21, 2010 @05:12AM
from the 30gbps-point-buck dept.

aesoteric writes "Google has revealed that aerial fiber links to its data center in Oregon were 'regularly' shot down by hunters, forcing the company to put its cables underground. Hunters were reportedly trying to hit insulators on electricity distribution poles, which also hosted aerially-deployed fiber connected to Google's $600 million data center in The Dalles. 'I have yet to see them actually hit the insulator, but they regularly shoot down the fiber,' Google's network engineering manager Vijay Gill told a conference in Australia. 'Every November when hunting season starts invariably we know that the fiber will be shot down, so much so that we are now building an underground path [for it].'"

I moved to Oregon from South Carolina... Arguably two of the most "redneck" states out there, except may be Idaho. What most city slickers don't realize about Oregon is that a lot of it is nature. With animals. Real animals. That will eat you.

The project I manage now is sandwiched between urban core and a rock quarry. Before the excavators moved in, we had a pack of coyotes hunting the area (and they'll be back as soon as we're done). When I hike, I regularly come across bear and cougar tracks and cougar kills. There are at least 3 cougars that share one of the urban parks with thousands of visitors. It's not unusual for trails to be posted with cougar sightings.

(For those of you who don't know, a cougar is a large cat, also known as a mountain lion.)

Many rural governments advise new residents to purchase a firearm to protect their property from assorted flesh-eating critters.

We also have a house in Europe, in the Czech Republic, which also has a long tradition of sport shooting and hunting. The wildlife is nowhere near as wild or abundant there.

So.... Yes there is a gun culture here in Oregon. The vast majority of gun owners here are responsible. Most of us responsible types stay away from the areas where the signs are shot up and people shoot at beer cans. There is a small minority of idiots. How's that different from any other population?

The only problem is that these idiots have guns. Darwin takes care of a few every year.

I work for a large utility holding company. Every new years and 4th of July we have transformers shot out across our system. They make pretty "sparks and arcs" while they die. Another stupid people trick is throwing chains across 2 live high voltage lines. Invariably, at least one person per year forgets to let go of the chain before it makes contact. Stupid people are everywhere. Darwin takes care of some...

anyway, googletroopers, expect them to have home-brew equipment which might seem slightly crude, but is actually miles ahead of modern day military hardware, very intuitive to operate... like a railgun (point-click-kill)

(and i just thought of something, if apple ever amassed an army of iTroopers, the black/white color scheme of stormtroopers certainly fits well doesnt it? kind of gives you a whole new perspective on steve's black turtleneck)

On the list of preaching, soap box standing zealots, I have found hunters to be the most vocal. Responsibility, conservation, and a given right to engage said pass-time is delivered in fire-brand like sermons.

From my observations, though, for every 1 responsible hunter there seem to be 10 irresponsible.

15 years ago, I did a stint as a volunteer park warden for 6 months. I noted the following:
- Bringing shot deer down to the nearest clearing, often walking tracks, partially butchering the animal and leaving the rest to rot on the track.
- Pot shots and damage to any and all infrastructure.
- "Boredom Kills" - usually birds shot with high powered rifles.
- Hunting dogs left to roam, sometimes till a following weekend, when the hunter would come back.
- Creepy comments to day hikers such as "I saw you long ago from across the valley, i saw you in my scope".

15 years later and hunters will still defend their pass time with the fervor of a rabid PETA campaigner, or Muslim cleric. Saving the world you know. Thinning pests, and over population of grazing animals...

When fox-hunting was banned in the UK, there was a pretty huge outcry from the hunting community, with modest support from locals/country folk etc, and ambivalence from most of the rest of us. However, it quickly became apparent that the only real / main reason to keep hunting going was to continue the 'tradition' and to keep a few people employed. I think at this point public opinion swung in support of the government, and I think most of us haven't looked back since.

I'm all for hunting for food, but hunting for sport just seems gratuitous and disrespectful to nature.

I dare you to list one single reason why a modern society _needs_ to _hunt_ for _food_. There are none.

Because they want to? No further justification necessary.

Otherwise you get stuck on the slippery slope to micromanagement madness. So, are cows more or less sentient than pigs? Is it more immoral to yank a living green onion out of the dirt and chop it up while its still alive, than to tear the dormant seeds off a fruit tree and eat them while they're "sleeping"? Is it more or less immoral to chop up an apple and then bake it into a pie, thus only torturing it for an hour or two, vs dehydrating apple sl

I personally find modern factory-farming to be a lot more hostile to animal-welfare than hunting a wild animal is.
Yes, the farmed animal can be killed in a more controlled fashion, so the death will be swifter and involve less pain. But on the flipside, that farmed animal might have spent it's entire life on a letter-sized piece of wiremesh, and never once even seen the sun.
What would you choose for yourself ? Life your entire life free, and then some day be shot from a distance. Or live your entire life in a prison, then one day be executed. I don't know your answer, but my guess would be, the overwhelming majority, would prefer living free.
Offcourse some people are of the opinion we shouldn't be eating meat at all. I can respect that, though I don't agree. it's atleast internally consistent.
But happily munching eggs from modern cage-hens, while complaining about hunting on animal-welfare grounds, seems rather strange to me.

15 years later and hunters will still defend their pass time with the fervor of a rabid PETA campaigner, or Muslim cleric. Saving the world you know. Thinning pests, and over population of grazing animals...

Hi there, hunter here from Wisconsin. Do you know that there are more deer in Wisconsin than before it was settled? It's true. And do you know why? There are no more wolves. The deer have no natural predators any more. Every year deer cost millions of dollars in crop damage and insurance claims. Almost 27000 deer/car collisions a year.* $28 million in crop damage.** They also destroy forests by eating new growth faster than it can recover. Yes they are cute and many people are afraid of guns due to ignorance and inexperience, but don't let that stop you from actually getting the facts.

And trust me, all the shitheads that want to go around poaching and shooting road signs and transformers piss off every decent hunter out there that has to defend themselves against stories like these. It's not the guns or the hunting that's the problem, it's STUPID PEOPLE.

When I used to work in the wireless Internet world, I had an associate who had much the same problem with idiots shooting at his antennas. After he had been forced to change antennas on several occasions, I told to him that the simple way to fix the problem was to mount a bullseye somewhere else on his towers and give these lunatics something different to aim at. The last time I talked to him his antennas were bullet hole free but he did have to replace a few of the targets due to them taking some serious damage.
Come on, Google, put some creative thought into solving these problems..

When I used to work in the wireless Internet world, I had an associate who had much the same problem with idiots shooting at his antennas. After he had been forced to change antennas on several occasions, I told to him that the simple way to fix the problem was to mount a bullseye somewhere else on his towers and give these lunatics something different to aim at. The last time I talked to him his antennas were bullet hole free but he did have to replace a few of the targets due to them taking some serious damage. Come on, Google, put some creative thought into solving these problems..

Have the targets shoot back. If the hunters want to man up about their sport, fucking man up.

That assumes the idiots are adequate-to-good shots.
A few of the towers my company owns get shot up each year. The damage is almost always to the antenna cables running up the tower within 10 feet above or below the tower lights. Occasionally they actually hit the light in the process, but not always.
And once every couple of years some douche shoots the hell out of the equipment shack. The record is 157 bullet holes in one 10x20 building.

We have a policy that there must be a vehicle parked visibly on-site if someone is working in the shack. Never drop off someone, then take the truck to another site.

The article says that HUNTERS regularly TRIED to hit the insulators. That's like those jackasses that shoot up stop signs for fun. It's called VANDALISM, not HUNTING.

I'm guessing the animal rights nuts and anti-gun people are thinking that hunters go in the woods, get bored, and start shooting at random objects to pass the time..

That makes absolutely no sense. Regardless of what game you're going after, if you make any noise at all, any game in the vicinity will take off. If you fire off a shot, you can pretty much pack it up and go home. You're not getting anything that day.

You didn't, for just a second, consider that maybe the hunters shooting at the insulators are hunters who are done for the day? and on their way back they decide to take a couple of shots at the insulators. I know it used to happen a lot here in northern Sweden, and unlike hunters in the US getting a hunting license here isn't just a matter of signing your name on a piece of paper, waiting a couple of weeks and then getting your brand new rifle.

Also, there are plenty of hunters who prefer target practice out in the woods to hanging out at a range, there are plenty of old sandpits around here where you can find cartridge cases strewn about from various hunters either getting some target practice in or simply trying out a new rifle.

OK. I see your point, but I still think my original point is valid. If you're wrecking property that isn't yours, the charge is going to be destruction of public or private property, not poaching. That means you'd be a vandal, not a hunter.

They're idiots who shouldn't be allowed off a supervised range with a gun. Shooting at a highly elevated target with no (likely) backstop but the sky is the height of firearms irresponsibility.

Just a few years back, some yahoo in Jersey let loose a few.30 cal rounds at a soaring turkey vulture. A couple miles away, a guy working on the roof of his suburban home took the round and died on the spot.

If you're not certain of your field of fire, you don't squeeze. Period.

It doesn't matter if they were hunters, hippies, or investment bankers. It seems that we have simply let the idiot to normal ratio get far to imbalanced in society. We need to repeal seatbelt laws, take the warnings off plastic bags, and let Darwin lean out the population a bit.

It's why non-Americans think the U.S. gun culture is so obviously insane. I remember talking to one person here on Slashdot who recommended that I read the Turner Diaries [wikipedia.org] (which is often sold at gun shows to gun enthusiasts) in order to understand the gun culture in America. The funny thing is he thought the Turner Diaries was a NORMAL and intellectually stimulating thing to read, just like the Bible.

For the rest of us (non-Americans), we think a love of guns and a feeling of necessity to own fire-arms by U.S. citizens is as fucked up as it is in the Middle East for ordinary citizens to own automatic military assault rifles. It's one thing to be Libertarian about gun ownership, and quite another to be fanatical about gun ideology and just plain Gun Happy, as most Americans seem to be.

The US military will split halfway between the government and the people in any such conflict. For one thing, the military's trained to never deploy against Americans; the disruption caused by illegal orders against tyrants and terrorists already causes breakdowns in chain of command, so you can imagine how well orders to "occupy" your own country and shoot at the people you've been told to "protect and serve" would work out. The armed forces would fragment; and the bigger the weapons we ordered out, the more would go against the government.

The USSR did it by posting people from one end of the country at another.Besides, there are plenty of examples in the last hundred years from Douglas McArthur preparing for riots to Kent State University in 1970 where US troops were prepared to use lethal force on US soil against US citizens. It's against pretty well everything the US armed forces are supposed to stand for but how much exactly has Rumsfeld in his attempt to "break the culture" and events since damaged the US armed forces?

>You'd think so, but the US Military has bigger guns and bigger idiots, so revolt could never occur.

I submit to you that the United States has been engaged in an unsuccessful bid to put down rebellions in at least two countries for the last 9 years and has been unable to do so, despite massively superior military power. I think everyone pretty much sees how this will turn out - we will eventually withdraw, just as the Soviets did, without having changed much of anything.

I also submit to you that this war is fought somewhere else and most US citizens just don't care. As one soldier put it, "The Marines are at war. America is at the mall." Also because of this, there is no damage to America's infrastructure. A rebellion at home would directly affect the citizens of this country and directly affect its infrastructure, causing massive economic fallout, massively eroding the tax base, thus hitting the government where it is most vulnerable - its wallet.

When the two DC Snipers went on their rampage shooting people at gas stations, the economic impact was in the millions of dollars just from people afraid to go put gasoline in their cars. Imagine the impact of outright civil war.

every time an invading soldier hurts his toe on a wooden splinter (or worse), you pick out 100 Iraqi's from whatever family is rumored to have something to do with the attack, and include their neighbors for good measure. You shoot them one by one in the town square, or alternatively slowly cut their throats (as the enemy does).

Did this work for the Soviets in Afghanistan? No, of course not. It didn't work for the Germans in France either. More importantly, it will never work unless you keep a large military force in the country forever. The United States does not want to keep a large military force in the country forever. It wants a stable, relatively free country, since that seems to work out best for everyone, the US included. Barring that, the US wants a stable, unfree but not threatening country.

Insurgencies don't work the way that you seem to think. You cannot kill your way out of them, since as you kill people, you make more insurgents. The improvements in Iraq came because we were more careful, not more indiscriminate, in who we killed, while attending to the social and cultural factors that could make the country more stable and non-threatening (cf. Petraeus). Afghanistan is even worse because it's not really a country so much as a collection of tribes and warlords and an arbitrary boundary.

As a WW2 history buff I say to thee respectfully the history of WWII contradicts EVERY POINT you've made.

"At which point did WWII partisans ever become a threat the third reich"?When they were killing soldiers left and right, blowing up transport and supplies, generally holding up whole divisions that could have been at the front?

"They were, at no point, capable of even attempting to attack any significant groups of German soldiers".Really, read a book or two. There where literally thousands of attacks on significant German forces, in Russia, in the Balkan, in France.

"And the groups collaborating with the Nazi's dwarfed, in almost all of Europe, the resistance".And the group that did nothing whatsoever dwarfed all the combined Nazi's AND the resistance.Your point?

As for Roman and other Fascist tactics in population decimation, complete control and massive retaliations against any and all resistance;That works so well that these Empires still thrive and survive, and are seen as admirable examples we should look up to.Idiot.

"For the rest of us (non-Americans), we think a love of guns and a feeling of necessity to own fire-arms by U.S. citizens is as fucked up as it is in the Middle East for ordinary citizens to own automatic military assault rifles. "

Lots of us think your utter submission to your governments, preference for the safety of lawbreakers over personal self-defense, and general sheeple tendencies aren't admirable either. You've traded freedom for (the perception of) security as is your right, but that only works in certain situations and assumes benign government.

The Middle Eastern populace clearly needs them for self-defense, and even the Coalition forces in Iraq allow one per household. If you cannot use force to protect yourself you have no _effective_ right to self-defense.

While those of you who are totally comfortable with your government controlling your lives and who live in areas without violent demographic/sectarian/criminal conflict may not care for firearms, they do go a long way to ensure sovereignty over ones own space.

Americans killed their way to freedom in the Revolution, killed those who supported slavery until they surrendered at Appomattox, and if the government gets bad enough will vote with the bullet again. We tolerate quite a bit of corporate abuse, as do the rest of you, but woe betide the government that goes too far. Mao was right, political power does flow from the barrel of a gun, and the requirement to kill opponents who won't respond to reason means that the tools to do that are worth keeping.

Both self and wife have used firearms in self-defense without firing them. We live in a rural area where the cops can't do more than react (clean up the mess), so relying on the kindness of others isn't a good idea. If you don't have a gun, anyone physicallly superior to you can do what they will.

So, owning guns is about "not being submissive to the government"? So, do gun-owners in USA refuse to pay taxes, break the law and otherwise disregard laws and regulations that are mandated and enforced by the government? Or do you follow them just like everyone else does? So, how exactly are those "Euro-hippies" and what have you "submissive" to their governments, while those American gun-owners are not?

preference for the safety of lawbreakers over personal self-defense, and general sheeple tendencies aren't admirable either.

How does gun-ownership turn person from a "sheeple" in to "non-sheeple"?

You've traded freedom for (the perception of) security as is your right, but that only works in certain situations and assumes benign government.

So, the argument is that in case of oppressive government, you can use your shotguns and what have you in defending freedom?

If you cannot use force to protect yourself you have no _effective_ right to self-defense.

If I slap you in the face, do you have to right to shoot my head off?

While those of you who are totally comfortable with your government controlling your lives

Could you explain how people who do not own guns are being "controlled by the government", while gun-owners are not? How about some tangible examples?

and who live in areas without violent demographic/sectarian/criminal conflict may not care for firearms, they do go a long way to ensure sovereignty over ones own space.

Maybe widespread availability of guns is one reason why your personal space is so threatened?

Mao was right, political power does flow from the barrel of a gun, and the requirement to kill opponents who won't respond to reason means that the tools to do that are worth keeping.

And what if the ones without guns are the ones being reasonable, while the ones with guns are being unreasonable? Couldn't those guns be used to prop up an oppressive regime, just as well they might be used to bring one down? How many US presidents or other high-ranking politicians have been assassinated, or faced an assassination-attempt?

Both self and wife have used firearms in self-defense without firing them.

Strange, I have never had the need for anything of the sort. But I'm just an Euro-hippie, so what do I know. It must be like living in the jungle in USA?

We live in a rural area where the cops can't do more than react (clean up the mess), so relying on the kindness of others isn't a good idea. If you don't have a gun, anyone physicallly superior to you can do what they will.

I lived in rural areas as well, and I never felt threatened by anyone. Yet I'm the one who is to be pitied, where you are the bastion of freedom to be envied? Even though you need to arm yourself to the teeth in order to be (or feel) safe?

There's a broad variety of reasons to own guns. Some people own guns because the police are not there to protect you and in some areas you NEED protection. Some people own guns because no government fears an unarmed populace, and government only works in the interest of the people when the government fears the people and not the other way around. Some people own guns because to them it is an economically advantageous way to acquire food. All of these are valid reasons in my book.

I lived in rural areas as well, and I never felt threatened by anyone. Yet I'm the one who is to be pitied, where you are the bastion of freedom to be envied? Even though you need to arm yourself to the teeth in order to be (or feel) safe?

I support responsible firearm ownership. I target shoot. I don't make the mistake of thinking I could take on a government with a couple of long guns and my personal ammo stash.

Exactly. I grew up in a household with guns. I was introduced to guns at an early age. And although I don't own any guns, I do enjoy shooting skeet and trap whenever possible. And I have been thinking about getting a small-caliber handgun to do target-practice. But not for a second do I think that I need guns to "protect myself" either from criminals or from the government.

And if the shit really it the fan, me and my gun would be next to useless when facing tanks, gunships and artillery. And if we really di

So you need armed populace in order to have functional government? Um, OK.

As do we all. Some have not yet realized this. Gandhi understood it, though: "Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest." This is from his Autobiography. Are we on the same page yet?

Similarly, people are the victims of violent crime and government oppression every day.

Sure. But that doesn't mean that I feel the need to carry guns with me.

Hell, I have never been in a situation where I have to defend my person or my property through use of force. Does that mean that I'm "missing out" on something?

It means you're lucky.

And, FWIW, I have never faced any "oppression" from the government.

Are you seriously telling me that you don't want to do anything your government doesn't want you to do, which you regard as reasonable? You're boring.

So, is USA such a shithole that you need guns to protect yourself from your neighbours and from the government? Because if I believed the gun-owners, that is the reality over there. And five seconds later they have said that, they start telling what a great place USA is. Huh?

"Lots of us think your utter submission to your governments, preference for the safety of lawbreakers over personal self-defense, and general sheeple tendencies aren't admirable either. You've traded freedom for (the perception of) security as is your right, but that only works in certain situations and assumes benign government."

Yet people in Europe don't feel oppressed, and have high levels of personal happiness (as well as other factors like health) whilst generally having better levels of literacy and numeracy. Most importantly, European "preference for the safety of lawbreakers over personal self-defense" seems to allow us to have vastly lower crime rates than in the US, particularly much lower gun crime rates, and certainly vastly fewer accidental injuries and deaths from firearms.

"The Middle Eastern populace clearly needs them for self-defense, and even the Coalition forces in Iraq allow one per household. If you cannot use force to protect yourself you have no _effective_ right to self-defense."

Yes, and we've seen how well it works. I'm sure the 1000s of Iraqis that die each month are more than happy with the self-defence their AK-47 offered them. Worked really well when it was the other guy who pulled the trigger first, or blew him up on his way to the market with an IED or car bomb.

"While those of you who are totally comfortable with your government controlling your lives and who live in areas without violent demographic/sectarian/criminal conflict may not care for firearms, they do go a long way to ensure sovereignty over ones own space."

Which is why the US also has higher levels of robbery than most European countries that have heavy restrictions on firearm ownership? Yeah, great sovereignty over your own space there.

"Americans killed their way to freedom in the Revolution, killed those who supported slavery until they surrendered at Appomattox, and if the government gets bad enough will vote with the bullet again. We tolerate quite a bit of corporate abuse, as do the rest of you"

Yes, we can see how well it turned out too. A two party state where each party is extremely heavily influenced by corporations to an incredible degree, and where elections can be turned if your relative happens to work at a popular news channel in a key state. Still, if it makes you feel better to tell yourself everyone else suffers the same corporate abuse US citizens do then you do that. Meanwhile we'll enjoy our statutory 5+ weeks holiday, our guaranteed redundancy pay, our strong protections on working conditions, our free healthcare and so on, all whilst maintaining a bigger economy alongside those afformentioned higher levels of personal happiness, healthcare, etc. than the US to boot!

"Both self and wife have used firearms in self-defense without firing them."

Really? That's pretty unfortunate. Here in Europe I've never been in such a situation where I'd have have had to do that, nor do I know anyone who has. Sounds like gun ownership helps ensure your country is a really nice place to live in.

I actually like shooting, it's a fun sport, but it's just that, a sport. You've got to be pretty insecure, or living in a pretty unfriendly country to think that a firearm is something you need to carry around with you everywhere you go, or necessarily to even keep one in your house. You can throw around terms like freedom, security, self-defence and so on as much as you want, but it doesn't change the cold hard fact that the US isn't really excelling in any important metric as a result of it's gun culture. If you have freedom why do corporations in the US have so much control both politically and personally? If you have guns as a deterrent to criminals, why is crime so high? If you feel safe, free, and secure as a result of gun ownership why do Americans report so much lower levels of personal happiness?

I so agree.The worst incursion I have had on myself or my living area stemmed from a misunderstanding of epic proportions, was at my home, and went so far as to get to fisticuffs until sanity was restored. Bruises were sustained, egos were bruised and stuff had to be discussed (and I even declined to press charges even when it was within my right to do so. No harm, no foul).

Notice that nobody got shot dead.

I live in Sweden, in the worst neighborhood within a few hundred kilometer radius. I know that somebody got beaten up with a bat a few months ago in the neighborhood (reportedly a drug debt, happened after he let the drug dealers he owed money to into his apartment).

Hunting weapons are widely owned in Sweden, and there's a large army base in the town. But people don't keep loaded 9mm pistols or semi-automatics in the glove box. This is a possible influencing factor why a misunderstanding did not get elevated to homicide. Neither party had a weapon which pierces human bodies easily with a feather light pull on the trigger at a time when fear and tempers flared high.Most excellent.

A shooting is a national headline in a country which has 31 guns per 100 residents (Sweden). USA does have 90 guns per 100 residents (according to wikipedia) but 31 is not a low number. Why is gun crime not just 1/3 of what it is in the USA?Different rules and different mentality?Or are the other 60 guns per 100 persons mostly handguns and sprayfire weapons specialized for killing people and no good for hunting?

As you can see, there are some stats where the US is equal to or above a handful of European nations, but in pretty much every case the US falls below the European average, and in some cases, is below that of all European nations.

Here's the core of the issue, I think. See, we feel that the government by and large submits to us. We can maybe not trust them as much as a well-trained dog, but enough not to try to engage in an arms race with them.

But I can actually understand that Americans don't trust their government. It seems to be somewhere between a cat and a hyena when it comes to trustability.

If a lot of households have weapons, it means that the criminals are more likely to carry a weapon. If the criminals are likely to carry weapons, it means that even more households will acquire a gun, too. Stalemate.

People in the UK have never carried guns and the ban has affected almost nobody. I've lived in London for 36 years and I have NEVER seen a gun, other than carried by the (rare) armed police, or military.

Which is why I provided a link to an article (which you did not read so I'll quote SOME of it for you). "On a June evening two years ago, Dan Rather made many stiff British upper lips quiver by reporting that England had a crime problem and that, apart from murder, 'theirs is worse than ours.'..... In the two years since Dan Rather was so roundly rebuked, violence in England has gotten markedly worse. Over the course of a few days in the summer of 2001, gun-toting men burst into an English court and freed two defendants; a shooting outside a London nightclub left five women and three men wounded; and two men were machine-gunned to death in a residential neighborhood of north London. And on New Year's Day this year a 19-year-old girl walking on a main street in east London was shot in the head by a thief who wanted her mobile phone. London police are now looking to New York City police for advice."

"None of this was supposed to happen in the country whose stringent gun laws and 1997 ban on handguns have been hailed as the "gold standard" of gun control...... The results -- the toughest firearm restrictions of any democracy -- are credited by the world's gun control advocates with producing a low rate of violent crime...... In reality, the English approach has not re-duced violent crime. Instead it has left law-abiding citizens at the mercy of criminals who are confident that their victims have neither the means nor the legal right to resist them."

"In the two years following the 1997 handgun ban, the use of handguns in crime rose by 40 percent, and the upward trend has continued. From April to November 2001, the number of people robbed at gunpoint in London rose 53 percent...... Your chances of being mugged in London are now six times greater than in New York. England's rates of assault, robbery, and burglary are far higher than America's, and 53 percent of English burglaries occur while occupants are at home, compared with 13 percent in the U.S., where burglars admit to fearing armed homeowners....."

"In 1969 police were informed "it should never be necessary for anyone to possess a firearm for the protection of his house or person." These changes were made without public knowledge or debate. Their enforcement has consumed hundreds of thousands of police hours. Finally, in 1997 handguns were banned. Proposed exemptions for handicapped shooters and the British Olympic team were rejected."

gimme a country in anarchy where the populace don't have easy access to guns than the most politically stable country in the world (which the US is *not*) where they do.

And this was modded as insightful? If Slashdot had a terminally naive moderation this post would certainly deserve it.

If you want to rant about the United States, rant about the United states, no one is going to stop you from doing so (Not even the US). But framing this as a discussion about firearms is disingenuous. Don't pretend that you care about firearms when what you really want to do is bash on the United States.

"Up until a few years before 9/11 you could have lectured the rest of the world on how to run a country. Now you're far more the problem than the solution."

And in that time the US government has taken far more power and individual rights have been eroded not expanded.American citizens had their guns long before 9/11.Which doesn't fall too neatly in line with your belief that it's the right to own guns and a weak government that's the problem but rather the opposite.

Technically it's not a POW camp, seeing as a majority of the "detainees" weren't part of a military of any sort involved in a war with the US - a "war on terror" is meaningless, you can't send a formal declaration of war to "terror".

It's an internment camp, and by extension a concentration camp. Look up the definition of both internment camp and concentration camp. The OP did not mention "nazi concentration camp", just concentration camp.

If its a POW camp then you have to follow the Geneva convention, which the US is not doing. If they are criminals, they have to be granted a trial and convict beyond a reasonable doubt, which the US has not done. If you are holding them there because you consider them dangerous undesirables, then it is a concentration camp.

Internment camp is simply another name for a concentration camp. A concentration camp is anywhere political prisoners are held in large numbers without trial. Gitmo fits the definition since it was specifically NOT designated a POW camp so as to avoid the Geneva convention. Having said that, I agree that US "internment camps" do not rise to anything like the level of inhumanity found in Nazi concentration camps.

Also the japanese-descended Americans during World War 2. Or have you forgotten how FDR unconstitutionally imprisoned Americans in concentration camps? He took their liberty, their property, their homes, their wealth, and imprisoned them without trial for almost four years. FDR makes Bush look like a nice guy in comparison. FDR was an ass that mistreated millions of American citizens.

But you've forgotten that. You've forgotten we had concentration camps right here on our own soil.

He was probably talking about the racism in the tuner diaries.Not everyone who believes a well armed populace helps to keep a government in line also wants to wipe out all the jews,gays and blacks.

I have no guns, I don't want any guns but I can still see it's a fairly sensible point of view.

If you live in a nice safe walled community with security guards keeping a gun close to hand is probably foolish since you're far more likely to shoot a neighbour or a teenage family member sneaking back in late at night

Some good points.
The OP's line of "your utter submission to your governments, preference for the safety of lawbreakers over personal self-defense, and general sheeple tendencies aren't admirable either. You've traded freedom for (the perception of) security as is your right, but that only works in certain situations and assumes benign government." si crying out for analysis, too. I don't see how owning a gun and being a core part of the American rightwing (i.e. a cog in the military-industrial complex) marks you out as being free from the government's influence, either.

Guns are supported by many on the left in American politics. We even have the Pink Pistols, a gay pro-gun group ("Armed gays don't get bashed"), and the NRA has endorsed many Democratic candidates based on their pro-gun stance.

I support this point of view, although I think guns are worthless in close combat. What are you going to do, kick, stepback, pull a ninja-block, draw gun, fire right into the side of the temple? You won't reach the gun; the guy'll block (and then break) your arm unless you whip out some Budo or Pentjak Silat or something on his ass. Guns only work when they're pointed at someone; we need martial arts training.

You sound like you've either swallowed your sensei's bullshit, or watched too many martial arts films. I have had three years of Taekwondo and one year of Jujitsu training and even I'll argue that a firearm is useful in close quarters. Most gun encounters occur within 15 feet, which is about a second away from physical contact with the bad guy. Even 0-5 feet, the gun is invaluable, and can stop an adversary or at least allow you to escape. And if your adversary has a gun, the only thing to give you a fighting chance is another gun.

Real fighting is not like the movies. In real life, a 125 lb black belt can easily be overpowered by a 250 lb guy with very little combat training. Sorry, but there's little that technique and training can do to overcome an attacker twice your size and strength (unless they're terribly bad fighters), especially if they're armed. A gun is the best equalizer in those cases.

Everyone seems to forget that there's this huge group of people who own firearms because they enjoy shooting.

We are some of those people. We have our firearms for home defense (we live in an apartment), and for going to the range. We both enjoy firing and talking about guns, but gun culture isn't something that interests us...we go to the range by ourselves, don't go to gun shows, and don't support the NRA.

If we've had a bad week though, off we go to the range to blow off some steam. It works wonders.

We both enjoy firing and talking about guns, but gun culture isn't something that interests us...

While a lot of modern "gun culture" in the US is juvenile and mixed in with some of the more idiotic ideas floating around our society, both the olde time hunting culture and the marksmanship cultures share some very valuable cultural traits. Most importantly, a strict, almost ritualistic adherence to firearm safety rules, even when they don't understand the purpose behind them. It's a trait that seems to be slowly going away which is sad. Too often I hear people joke about pointing guns at others and knowing they aren't loaded and such, all of which misses the point. The idea of conditioning yourself with safe behaviors through repetition, so that you behave safely when you don't have time to think clearly is, frankly, beyond a lot of people. It's too bad more people don't have a grouchy grandfather or strict sergeant enforcing said conditioning and making sure they pass it on.

I'm an american, and outside law enforcement officers, I've seen perhaps 3 or 4 guns in private possession in my life. I suppose they must be out there somewhere, and I've sure heard stories that make me shake my head, but I think those stories get a little overblown with regards to how many of us own or carry a gun.

Depends on where you live. Down here in S. Florida I once worked in a small company where everyone owned at least a pistol. In my previous company I regularly went to the range with four or five co-workers. On my block at least six homes have firearms and the firearms per household ratio is higher than 1.0.

I see shooting in many ways to be like archery. It's not something I'd consider using for defense, but the peace and satisfaction it gives me is healthy. On shooting days I wake up at 5AM, don't drink c

As kindly as I can say this, maybe they think you're a burglary risk? Or your friends/coworkers live in a generally high crime area like the coasts?

Only criminals or the extremely poor have cheap guns. Guns are generally a very long term capital expense, unlike virtually all other hobbies discussed on Slashdot. Realize that my grandfathers.45 has had a vaguely constant value for a couple decades, unlike say, used PC video cards. That leads to "trading up" and "collecting" behavior, and after a couple decades and/or generations of inheritance, ending up with a gun safe worth as much as a car. Sure, you could sell and get the cash, but if you went hunting with grandpa for 20 great seasons, after he dies and you inherit his rifle you're not going to sell either yours or his, way too many good memories about growing up, etc.

Someone whom would discuss their collection of decent condition rare engraved inlaid over-under duck hunting shotguns with anyone they meet is about as intelligent as someone whom would discuss their extremely heavy gold coin collection with anyone they meet...

Seems you've answered your own question. I'm willing to bet that you know lots of people with both guns AND carry permits, but they're well aware of your irrational fear of inanimate objects so they just don't tell you.

This is Slashdot and I'm prefectly comfortable with having a discussion, but there is a lot of blind hatred that came out in this thread against gun owners that was being modded very high and was really rather vitriolic.

I'm sorry if my post came across as something more than was intended.

With regard to firearms, I've been encouraged many times to never let on to the fact that I own any, or where I keep them. They are a high value target for thieves. As a result, unless I'm very familiar with the person, I don't bring up my ownership of firearms. (Not worried about Slashdot, the people I'm worried about wouldn't know this username)

I know people in the Twin Cities carry concealed quite often--enough that the hospital I sometimes go to work has a "no guns allowed in building" sign and a locker where you can check-in your weapon is full.

Wisconsin is open carry (no concealed carry) and recently there's been some activity with people doing everyday things (pick up garbage, going out to dinner) while openly carrying. Police--especially the police-state type of police--of course freak out until after they arrest someone and realize it is within their right to openly carry.

Then the police are hit with a lawsuit (I believe that's what's going to happen in a recent Madison, WI case)

The pendulum of a government-sponsored police state has swung too far for people in my region to feel comfortable. The gun-rights advocates are pushing it back in their own way. When Obama was elected, you could not easily find ammunition to buy. It was being scooped up as fast as it could be delivered to sporting stores. It was not because a bunch a crazy citizens thought a black-man president was going to take away their weapons, it was because the message of $400 spent on 1000 bullets is heard much more clearly than any angry saying on a bumper sticker.

Actually, it *was* because there were a lot of people that thought they were going to lose access to ammo. There were numerous new reports at the time featuring interviews with shop owners and customers. It was quite eye opening at the time - I didn't realize that people were that nuts.

I'm proud how patriotic citizens like you prevented our Kenyan in chief from proclaiming the People's Republic of America and turning this proud nation into a SOCIALISM.

I mean, hey, the stimulus act contained $300bn in tax breaks but when Obama does it, it must be SOCIALISM.

And that infrastructure spending Republican congressmen and business associations wanted? Now Obama is in favor of it, so it must be SOCIALISM.

And extending tax breaks a Republican president and Republican congress scheduled to expire for anyone but the richest 2% that never had lower taxes anyway since they came up with the income tax. SOCIALISM.

I'm sure if you just keep watching Glen Beck and buy ammo and gold capitalism can yet prevail.

You misunderstand what rights are. They are not things government must provide you with (clean water, justice, housing, food, hookers etc. etc. etc.), they are things government may not take from you (life, liberty, pursuit of happiness). Defining it in such a way that government gets to decide what rights you have and how you may exercise them as you just did is fundamentally incompatible with the freedom to make ones own choices and to order ones own life as one sees fit.

Ah, so a citizen trying to live freely should consider a global information aggregator as a harmless and healthy part of society, eh?

Yes. Because unless they are some dumbass redneck there is no way to argue that shooting at their equipment is a good response. In fact even the dumb hicks who did it would probably "argue" that they were just pissing around because they were wasted. It takes a real armchair nutjob like you to claim that they were in the right against some evil global multinational.

Where I live you can't have guns, but people still find ways to be fucktards. Popular passtimes are throwing pavement tiles from overpasses, cutting or shorting cables and stealing bikes, street signs and street lanterns. No, I don't know what they use the street lanterns for.

Is it just me or does it seem as if "fucktards" are the only people buying guns in the US?

No, they are the ones getting all the headlines but the reality is that the typical gun owner tends to be a very responsible, level-headed, person. It's like how most people can enjoy an occasional beer or glass of wine without causing any commotion but alcohol still has a bad reputation because some idiot overdoes it and then drives and kills a bunch of people.

I've been around guns my entire life and have many friends who had the same kind of upbringing. At no point have I EVER seen a legal gun owner brandish his weapon or use it in some sort of unsafe or idiotic manner. In fact most hunters and gun owners that I know are extremely responsible, civically-minded, kind-hearted people - MUCH more so than the average public.

On the other hand illegal gun owners tend to be unsavory and uncaring about the damage they do with their weapons. They are the ones likely to shoot the gun in the air on New Year's Eve, shoot out signs and lights, brandish it at any provocation, keep it unsafely around minors, etc. Any illegal gun ownership or usage should be harshly punished.

Did they steal the overhead electric power lines for the trains? That's happened in the UK, although it's more usual for them to steal the signalling cables (which can still be quite a high voltage, but are presumably easier to steal).

I don't see the point of stealing rails, scrap steel isn't worth much compared to copper.

I worked for a ISP that had a POP in the sticks. It's feed would regularly be shot by some stupid hick. There was also only one telco field tech for the area, and it would take him forever to respond and even longer to resolve the issue. The city has its own issues. Once a very large section of copper was stolen from the telco taking out an untold number of consumers.

If you work for telcos that have thousands of miles of fibre traversing farmland, you'll quickly come to appreciate (especially in the hunting season) that shotgun damage is a fact of life.

And no, the hunters are not shooting at the fibre or insulators, but at the pheasant, grouse and other flying game creatures that routinely alight on the overhead cables (usually power lines) that carry the fibre.

Because I'm in it for the food, not for the fun (it's okay if it's fun as well though) and because without guns hunting is a high-energy activity with a poor risk:reward ratio.Explain to me please why you think the subject line is part of the comment. It's labeled, you'd think you could tell the difference.

Also, cables cover a MUCH larger area than insulators - i.e. there is whole lot of cables to be hit while missing insulators.And shooting with shot might not reach the insulators with enough force to do any damage, but just nicking the optic fibre might warrant servicing/replacement.

They sure do. but at least you can send out untrained crews across the area and ID where your breaks are exactly, so the next available trained repair crew and come out and attend to it.. repairing utilities in a vault or in a trench isn't as easy.

You generally don't need untrained crews to find a break. You use an Optical Time-Domain Reflectometer to identify the location of the cut within a few hundred feet, and then you send out your splicing and underground/aerial crews.
Upon arrival to a site the crew will either find an abandoned construction site or vehicle accident. Construction crews generally leave the site when they hit a cable because they know work is done for the day and their employer is about to have an unpleasant phone call from someone like me. The bill for a cut like this runs in the tens of thousands of dollars.

If an obvious break isn't found, then you have to start looking for squirrel chews on aerial and rat chews in underground conduit. That's generally just a partial break so you can roll your fiber at the two nearest splice points onto good dark fibers, or at least fibers occupied by lower speed systems.